Three Ponds is one of the few trails on the Red Cliffs side that's regularly hiked and biked by the same crowd. The trail starts at the Cottonwood Trail trailhead near I-15 exit 22, climbs gradually through a dirt-and-rock corridor, and ends at three slickrock potholes that fill with snowmelt water in the spring. It rides as a five-mile out-and-back with one technical pinch and a slow finish at the ponds.
A trail that's also a hike
BLM signage at the trailhead designates Three Ponds as multi-use with bikes yielding to hikers, and on busy spring weekends the trail sees more pedestrians than bikes. Riding etiquette here matters: slow approaches, ring a bell, and accept that some sections will be slow. Most locals ride it on weekday mornings or in late afternoon when foot traffic thins.
The seasonal ponds
The three slickrock potholes at the trail's end are seasonal — they fill from snowmelt and monsoon runoff and hold water for a few weeks in spring and after summer storms. By late June most years the ponds are dry. Riders who visit in March or April catch the headline shot: red slickrock framing reflective pools with the desert sky overhead. By August the same spot is a dry sandstone basin.
The technical pinch
About halfway up, the trail squeezes through a narrow rock pinch that asks for either a dab or a slow technical move. It is the only feature on the trail that earns more than a blue rating, and walking through costs nothing. The rest of the climb is straightforward intermediate dirt singletrack.
Where Three Ponds sits in the 435
Three Ponds is the trail that pairs the Red Cliffs hiking network with the bike network. It connects via the Cottonwood Trail to the larger Red Cliffs trail web, and riders can stack a Three Ponds out-and-back with a Church Rocks loop for a full half-day of riding off I-15 exit 22. The seasonal potholes also make it one of the few mountain bike trails in Washington County where the destination is the reason to ride.